And the Hurriyat cynically uses the quake…

The Mirwaiz and his clique have no right to prick India Inc’s conscience

Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, supposedly the moderate face of a potentially politically acceptable Hurriyat, sought to remind corporate India of its duty. The Indian Express reports that he sent the rest of India this ‘wake-up call’.

As thousands wept while they prayed for the quake victims, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, who led special prayers at Srinagarâ€™s Jamia Masjid today, sent the rest of India a wake-up call: â€˜â€˜It is sad that people have not responded to this great tragedy. This was not expected. When Latur and Bhuj were ravaged, big industrialists stepped forward to help. But no one seems to be coming to our aid.â€™â€™[IE]

An insinuation, and a rather obvious one, that India is not treating its Kashmiri citizens with the same sympathy that it reserves for rest. The Mirwaiz, of course, did not find it necessary to mention that thanks largely to the more than a decade long reign of terror unleashed by his supporters, much of the state of Jammu & Kashmir is effectively out of bounds to ordinary citizens.

Nor did he find it necessary to consider that geography plays an important role in how fast aid — private or official — can reach disaster victims. And wasn’t it the Hurriyat’s ‘boys’ who were killing railway engineers in order to prevent Kashmir from being better connected to the rest of India?

And it is particularly ironic that the Hurriyat leader sought to remind India Inc of its duty. For last November, the Hurriyat pooh-poohed the Indian prime minister’s special economic development package for Kashmir. Money for schools and buildings, they said, gave them the ‘feeling that the government just wants to buy them over’.

And when Kashmir was hit by another, relatively smaller disaster earlier this year — heavy snowstorms in February — the jihadis took advantage of the Army being diverted for relief operations and used the opportunity to launch suicide attacks. The Mirwaiz did not condemn them then.

And why, jihadi terrorists brutally murdered 12 villagers in Kashmir even before the earth had settled after recent quake. The Hurriyat saw no need to condemn that act of violence.

That India needs to improve its disaster management system has been abundantly clear for some time now, especially after the tsunami. That hundreds of thousands of people feel that aid is not reaching them as fast as they would desire is also clear. But it is also necessary to document that the India — led by the Indian Army, which has the most effective reach on the ground — is doing its best to deliver relief to its affected citizens. The Hurriyat remains true to its churlish form when it tries to paint a deliberately misleading picture by focussing on what India Inc is doing or not doing to help. What the Mirwaiz is doing is cynically exploiting raw emotions of disaster victims and using them to serve his partisan agenda. Before he proceeds any further, he would do well to dwell on the observations of Amanullah Khan, chief of one of the oldest Kashmiri terrorist organisations, and resident of Pakistani occupied Kashmir.

It’s a shame as the government on the other side acted promptly and provided relief and rescue in all the affected areas. People are angry here as they think Islamabad has double standards, even in handling natural disasters. [IE]

Update: To its credit, the ‘BBC’ has a balanced report on why private aid is less conspicuous in this case.

8 thoughts on “And the Hurriyat cynically uses the quake…”

I haven’t heard anything about Hurriyat leaders themselves donating any big amounts to their fellow Kashmiris either. It seems they also conveniently forgot the plight of Kashmiri hindus ands sikhs too, who have been driven away from their ancestral homes due to ethnic cleansing done by jihadis supported by them, and who have been living in tents and filth for past almost 2 decades. None of them spoke about them ever.

btw, why the heck is Shekar Gupta is asking for ceasefire from Indian Army. Is’nt he aware of the recent throat slittings? Infact, we should not let our guards down since with all the billions of aid dollars pouring in, it should be easy for the Pakistani military establishment to divert them to jehadi groups.

all great points nitin.
however, it would bode well if the industralists were galvanized to offer relief of some sort.
monetary or kind.
this could go a long way in facilitating the laying of the non-kashmiri business anchor in kashmir…and who knows maybe down the lane someday, when an average kashmiri is employed in an “indian” call centre or other service….we may finally be able to challenge article 370.

nukh, _very_ interesting thesis – “facts on the ground” as pioneered by Sharon. Make 370 irrelevant. In effect, that’s what the Mirwaiz is asking for in the first place – equal treatment with the rest of India. This guy is clearly not the sharpest tool in the shed 🙂

The cynicism displayed by the Mirwaiz and Mr. Malik is fairly obvious. The credulity of some media–whether genuine or otherwise–is not likely to be shared by the people on the ground in J&K. Mr. Malik’s antics–whether distributing relief in J&K or, now, proposing to buy relief in Islamabad for PoK residents–are not likely to convince jaded Valley residents.

Why, for example, can’t Mr. Malik simply donate the money to the Pakistanis and continue his saintly relief-work in J&K? But Mr. Malik has a deep attraction for the media spotlight: Relief-work is simply yet another opportunity to preen before the media and flog his secessionist politics before a (perhaps willingly) credulous media.

Well said, Nitin. Plus the article itself notes that the Indian army (which is the only outfit positioned to help) is helping. I might also add that among the places Mirwaiz mentions in his lament are “Muzaffarabad”– quoi? Does he really expect “India Inc.” to jump in for PoK?

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I haven’t heard anything about Hurriyat leaders themselves donating any big amounts to their fellow Kashmiris either. It seems they also conveniently forgot the plight of Kashmiri hindus ands sikhs too, who have been driven away from their ancestral homes due to ethnic cleansing done by jihadis supported by them, and who have been living in tents and filth for past almost 2 decades. None of them spoke about them ever.

Laks

Well said Nitin. I really don’t have anything to add to this post.

btw, why the heck is Shekar Gupta is asking for ceasefire from Indian Army. Is’nt he aware of the recent throat slittings? Infact, we should not let our guards down since with all the billions of aid dollars pouring in, it should be easy for the Pakistani military establishment to divert them to jehadi groups.

nukh

all great points nitin.
however, it would bode well if the industralists were galvanized to offer relief of some sort.
monetary or kind.
this could go a long way in facilitating the laying of the non-kashmiri business anchor in kashmir…and who knows maybe down the lane someday, when an average kashmiri is employed in an “indian” call centre or other service….we may finally be able to challenge article 370.

Didn’t I hear Infosys donating 1 crore to the relief effort in Kashmir and a similar amount for Pakistan.

libertarian

nukh, _very_ interesting thesis – “facts on the ground” as pioneered by Sharon. Make 370 irrelevant. In effect, that’s what the Mirwaiz is asking for in the first place – equal treatment with the rest of India. This guy is clearly not the sharpest tool in the shed 🙂

Kumar

Nitin:

The cynicism displayed by the Mirwaiz and Mr. Malik is fairly obvious. The credulity of some media–whether genuine or otherwise–is not likely to be shared by the people on the ground in J&K. Mr. Malik’s antics–whether distributing relief in J&K or, now, proposing to buy relief in Islamabad for PoK residents–are not likely to convince jaded Valley residents.

Why, for example, can’t Mr. Malik simply donate the money to the Pakistanis and continue his saintly relief-work in J&K? But Mr. Malik has a deep attraction for the media spotlight: Relief-work is simply yet another opportunity to preen before the media and flog his secessionist politics before a (perhaps willingly) credulous media.

Kumar

gaurav

Professional victimhood is a curse of this PC Era.
Mr Mirwaiz is just cashing on it.

Well said, Nitin. Plus the article itself notes that the Indian army (which is the only outfit positioned to help) is helping. I might also add that among the places Mirwaiz mentions in his lament are “Muzaffarabad”– quoi? Does he really expect “India Inc.” to jump in for PoK?